


Deluded Fantasies

by Michelleleahhh



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-23
Updated: 2014-03-23
Packaged: 2018-01-16 18:16:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1357213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Michelleleahhh/pseuds/Michelleleahhh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, when I am high on the drugs that Gale pushes up my nose, I dream of Peeta Mellark entering a dark room where I’m fighting my dreaded demons. In his varsity wrestling jacket, he would wake me from my terror and comfort me. (AU, Dark)</p>
<p>This is just a deleted scene from Katniss’ POV of my story: Forgotten Things. You do not need to read the story for it. :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deluded Fantasies

I went to bed every night dreaming of the chance that I would be in the embrace of Peeta Mellark. I would fluff my pillows around me and pretend it was his arms that wound themselves around my middle, like a cave enshrouding and protecting me. It was fantasies like these that made my terrors skate away, but I was just a child. Just a pubescent teen looking to stop the fighting outside the walls of my room that fortified me. 

The first night I dreamt to be in his arms is haunted by our first memory. One that was just as beautiful as everything I imagined. 

I remember how I naively fell into slumber, like a princess nestled in the arms of her prince, and dreamt of playground promises that grew to be as foreign as those pretend nights. 

__ 

He watched from the swings as my only friend and I ran around the school playground; her long blonde hair danced in the wind and face upturned into a wide smile. Her arms flailed around her as if to catch an invisible ghost and suddenly, out of no where, her hands flew to throw me off course. After landing with a thump on the wood chips near the swings, I sat broken and began to cry.

He jumped off the swing running to my side. Madge had already tried to help me up but her attempt was fruitless only gaining more tears from me. I hated crying, dad always said I was better than that, but I couldn’t stop. 

“Please don’t be sad, I didn’t mean to,” Madge’s voice chimed in the breeze. 

I stopped crying, listening to my fathers imagined voice in my head, and eased my hard, ragged breaths. I clumsily brought my hand to my eyes, wiping the tears from my face as Madge ran after a butterfly that whizzed pass her. 

“Madge didn’t mean to, she’s just happy and didn’t see you. I’m Peeta.” He helped me up and I met his eyes. Blue, crisp, like the clear oceans I only saw on mom’s post cards that hung around our basement. His eyes were deep like the Atlantic, full of emotion as I childishly tried to read each one.

I couldn’t stop the sly, awkward smile that spread and clasped my hands together in front of me. “Hi.”

“Hi,” he said staring at me, but my face was tilted to the side my eyes skirting away from his. 

“I’m Katniss.”

“You should watch where you’re going you could get really hurt.” I took him in again, only to realize he looked like one of those princes in Disney fairytales that saved the princesses. His curled blonde hair and pale skin was only decorated by the scattered freckles across his nose. I giggled and my hand flew to my mouth, sneaking glances back and forth to see if anyone heard me. 

“I didn’t mean to, my mommy always calls me clumsy though. But I’m actually really good on my feet. My dad and I go into the woods and climb trees” My hands slid down my waist as he peered at me through his orbs. “Do you think I’m clumsy?”

“No I think you’re pretty,” He shyly whispered. 

I smiled brightly and a red heat covered my olive cheeks. “I think you’re pretty, too.” His smile grew even larger, like the cheshire cat in the story mom read Prim late at night to fall asleep. “Oooh, you have a pretty smile. Can I see it again?” He smiled at me again and I smiled back. 

”Hey Peeta?” I asked looking into his sapphire spheres. “Will you be my boyfriend?”

He stepped back, his smile faded, his head shook and reeled at what I said, “Girls have cooties.”

“No they don’t!” I stomped my foot and scowled at him and his absurd accusations. “I’m not a girl, I’m Katniss.”

I think he pretended to go over my question because he mocked me but putting his hands on his chin, but I knew he was going to say yes. 

“Yeah. I guess” He grinned at me. 

I let out a strangled cry of happiness and the bell rang signaling all the kids to enter the building. “I love you, Peeta.” I said smiling at him. I leaned in, pecked his lips and ran inside the building. Leaving him there in the wood chips he had just saved me from. I couldn’t wait to tell Madge about Prince Peeta saving me. 

__

Although harsh voices were there whispering about death and cancer, I woke that morning content to start my day at school. Even if Peeta was senior and I was a mere high school freshmen, I could watch from afar. I could imagine he would save me if I tripped into a locker, or couldn’t find my way to class. 

But that morning is a distant memory. A recollection that is permanently slammed shut at the possibility of us, now I know there will never be an “us.” Peeta was too kind for this world, but now he’s not. 

He’s just the same as all the other boys who caved to societies’ expectations of debauchery and revelries. With his Southern Comfort and Dartmouth Wrestling apparel, he is just another clone of the thousands of privileged college students who believe they make the world a better place. 

Every night when I fluffed my pillows, I thought of a moment, just like that one. A fantasy that if I lived anywhere else we would have courted, dated, and lived better than a Prince and Princess. We would have been more than just one of the numerous late night encounters that had crawl over me at night. 

No longer could pillows comfort me by pretending to be his arms. No longer could the dreams stay away. There are only terrors that end in screams, sweat and sadness. I wish there could be a natural remedy like his imagined limbs were when I was a inexperienced and gullible teen. Whether I was a daydreaming freshmen, or a little girl stranded on wood chips crying because skinned knees ruined my day, there was no similar sedation to my nightmares now.

Sometimes, when I am high on the drugs that Gale pushes down my throat or up my nose, I dream of Peeta Mellark entering a dark room where I’m fighting my dreaded demons. In his varsity wrestling jacket, he would wake me from my terror and envelope and comfort me. I would rest my head on his chest and be lulled by the erratic thumping of his heart.

But that doesn’t happen. 

Then I’m sober and remember I can’t escape, and pretending in a falsehood where Peeta Mellark leaves his padded and luxurious cushion to save poor Katniss Everdeen is just as idiotic as praying for death to be undone. 

It’s impossible, and never will be, but that doesn’t stop my deluded fantasies.


End file.
